A Tokusatsu Show Almost Forgot: Majin Bander #1

While I have many tokusatsu shows I hope to watch again even besides the Ultra Series out of the ones I enjoyed watching when I was a child, the show “Majin Bander/Bandā” is also one of them.

“Majin” is the Japanese word to be literally translated into English as “evil human” often representing a being that has a magical power even if it is not exactly a human. It could be translated as “warlock” or, according to the nature of the character, “genie” in English.

Incidentally, it is known that the name of the popular anime robot “Mazinger Z” was from the association between this word “majin” and “mashin (machine)” as they phonetically sound similar in Japanese.

It is said that “Majin Bander” was the tokusatsu show aired in 1969 with 13 episodes while the series was shortened for an unknown reason although it had been planned to have 26 episodes in the first place.

It seems that it was initially planned to have a tokusatsu series feature “Majin Garon” based on the manga authored by Osamu Tezuka, but it didn’t go well and it is likely that the plan was replaced by the one about the show “Majin Bander.”

In my impression, the show looked very much old-fashioned or outdated even when I watched it as a kid. And it is no surprise when I have learnt that the series had finished being produced in 1966 and that the broadcasting had been postponed indefinitely due to affairs to secure the time slot for this show.